Restraint - a generative piece using ilep, lo-fi piano, and the Pagefall hall of fame

Svetlovska

Can’t help but wonder how many sales the otherwise brilliant Tal-u-no lx used for bass interventions here must have lost to people not being able to find the damn thing on the App Store because of that mouthful of a name?

Anyhoo, it goes luvverly with @lofi_piano’s wonderful, um, Lo-fi piano, which in turn goes luver-luverly with weird VCS3 matrix style multi FX ilep https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/ilep/id1388225714.

I used @pagefall’s Cality to turn Autony’s mono line into a chordal sequence, and set Autony at playing only 30 % of the time, relying on @sonosaurus’ great YaleD reverse delay and a metric ahem-ton of reverbs to fill the resulting gaps in a vaguely musical way.

Following Loopop’s wise suggestion in his YouTube piece on generative music:

that a little order goes a long way in nailing down generative stuff, I used Atom to capture a first pass of the sequence, and set it looping to drive the Tal-whatever bass drones as a way of imposing some order. Finally I switched between three differently filtered versions of the parts on mix buses using MM-1 for a little sonic variety.

I switched out everything at the end manually, (hey, I usually let the apps do all the work - what do I pay them for anyway?) and let YaleD handle the fade out for me. All recorded ‘live’ as it were, inside AUM, and uploaded from AudioShare to Soundcloud. No keyboards or DAWs were harmed during the making of this piece. Enjoy!

Gavinski

I really want to listen to this Svetlovska, but your link at the top says 'external server error', though loopop's video appears as normal. Weird

Svetlovska

@Gavinski : weird, thanks for mentioning it. I’ve moved the link further down in the body of the text in case it going first in the box was causing some kind of issue (? - I have no idea about these things). It works for me (but did before). Let me know if there’s still a problem.

Gavinski

Who knows, where I am I need vpn to access YouTube and Soundcloud, but my vpn is working fine, so... Who knows. Can other ppl listen to / see your track I wonder?

MrBlaschke

@Gavinski
Just listened - all good here. Home Network with iPad and no VPN

@Svetlovska
Nicely done! Thanks for sharing.

Philandering_Bastard

Sounds excellent.

Tried it again with VPN, still excellent.

Gavinski

😂 @Philandering_Bastard

[Deleted User]

I like it. Thanks for sharing the process too.

Scarred_Archimedes

Quite sublime.

reasOne

this is excellent sound and really dope process to achieve it.
def wouldn’t mind seeing some videos on you doing things like this live

Charlesalbert

I love your sound @Svetlovska .

Recently every time I play I tried to study your track before and try to capture your secret formula.

Gavinski

Finally working! Very beautiful, imagine how it would sound with a touch of bundle magic death eye on top, one can only dream

aplourde

Beautiful! I especially like it when the sharper notes poke through, like shafts of sunlight piercing a gentle mist.

Svetlovska

@Gavinski @MrBlaschke @Philandering_Bastard @despego @Scarred_Archimedes @aplourde : thank you al for the listens, and your kind words

@reasOne , thank you too, but I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t get much out of watching my, ahem, ‘process’ which begins in bed around 6am with me idly picking an app or two and starting to noodle around with them inside AUM, and progresses after breakfast to me slouching around the house in my dressing gown while some kind of loop plays, pausing occasionally to randomly stab at settings and knobs in a chimp-meet-typewriter kind of way until the noise is tamed into something that sounds like it might actually be a thing.

‘Jamming’ would be too dignified a term for this process, as it implies somebody who knows what they are doing, or at least can play, maybe even name, a chord or two. None of these things are true of me, sadly.

Likewise, @Charlesalbert, thank you for suggesting I might have a ‘secret formula’ (I am blushing 😊).

My ‘formula’ fwiw, since I discovered the liberating micro-genre of ‘Dark Ambient’ (combining my inner teen Goth love of all things dark with grown-up me’s need for a bit of peace and quiet) could probably be distilled down into ‘a year spent listening to ever longer reverbs.’

I like that some of the stuff I seek out to listen to for fun is actually made by depressed Russians living in half abandoned industrial cities in the Arctic Circle, for whom the distant metal noises, mournful wolves and howling winds captured in their work probably count as verbatim field recordings; and the other half is probably made by somebody called Kevin who lives in a maisonette in Sidcup and just wishes he was a depressed Russian in the Arctic Circle. (Hey, Kevins are cool, alright? Sidcup? Eh, not so much...)

Either way, give me some titanic subterranean groans and Lovecraftian Immensity (TM) with the reverb set to 11, and I’m a happy Shoggoth.

Gavinski

Your longer bits of writing here are always good, but this one was fantastic, and very very funny too.

Svetlovska

@Gavinski : Thank you. I aim to please btw I looked at Magic Death Eye following your name check - pricey! I’m not a very technical mixer of my stuff, I know in theory what compression does, sort of, and I know people talk about ‘tightening up ‘ a mix , making drums punchier etc, but how would you describe what it could do to this track? A tricky ask, I know. I have some other compression apps, and being a total effect tart I’ve tried them on various things, but I’ve always found their impact a bit too subtle for my tastes. A bit like people talking about FabFilter stuff, I’m just not sure I have the engineering ears or technique to justify such an outlay.

gusgranite

Sidcup 😂

Lovely piece.

Philandering_Bastard

Today I learned that there is a place called Sidcup.

Not sure how to proceed.

Svetlovska

@Philandering_Bastard : deny everything! They may already know...

Philandering_Bastard

Paul16

@Svetlovska said:
@Gavinski @MrBlaschke @Philandering_Bastard @despego @Scarred_Archimedes @aplourde : thank you al for the listens, and your kind words

@reasOne , thank you too, but I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t get much out of watching my, ahem, ‘process’ which begins in bed around 6am with me idly picking an app or two and starting to noodle around with them inside AUM, and progresses after breakfast to me slouching around the house in my dressing gown while some kind of loop plays, pausing occasionally to randomly stab at settings and knobs in a chimp-meet-typewriter kind of way until the noise is tamed into something that sounds like it might actually be a thing.

‘Jamming’ would be too dignified a term for this process, as it implies somebody who knows what they are doing, or at least can play, maybe even name, a chord or two. None of these things are true of me, sadly.

Likewise, @Charlesalbert, thank you for suggesting I might have a ‘secret formula’ (I am blushing 😊).

My ‘formula’ fwiw, since I discovered the liberating micro-genre of ‘Dark Ambient’ (combining my inner teen Goth love of all things dark with grown-up me’s need for a bit of peace and quiet) could probably be distilled down into ‘a year spent listening to ever longer reverbs.’

I like that some of the stuff I seek out to listen to for fun is actually made by depressed Russians living in half abandoned industrial cities in the Arctic Circle, for whom the distant metal noises, mournful wolves and howling winds captured in their work probably count as verbatim field recordings; and the other half is probably made by somebody called Kevin who lives in a maisonette in Sidcup and just wishes he was a depressed Russian in the Arctic Circle. (Hey, Kevins are cool, alright? Sidcup? Eh, not so much...)

Either way, give me some titanic subterranean groans and Lovecraftian Immensity (TM) with the reverb set to 11, and I’m a happy Shoggoth.

Ahhhhhh, Sidcup.
Decades back, urban legends of a Mi-go Tok’l mine in the area were common, but I never found it.

Paul16

@Paul16 said:

@Svetlovska said:
@Gavinski @MrBlaschke @Philandering_Bastard @despego @Scarred_Archimedes @aplourde : thank you al for the listens, and your kind words

@reasOne , thank you too, but I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t get much out of watching my, ahem, ‘process’ which begins in bed around 6am with me idly picking an app or two and starting to noodle around with them inside AUM, and progresses after breakfast to me slouching around the house in my dressing gown while some kind of loop plays, pausing occasionally to randomly stab at settings and knobs in a chimp-meet-typewriter kind of way until the noise is tamed into something that sounds like it might actually be a thing.

‘Jamming’ would be too dignified a term for this process, as it implies somebody who knows what they are doing, or at least can play, maybe even name, a chord or two. None of these things are true of me, sadly.

Likewise, @Charlesalbert, thank you for suggesting I might have a ‘secret formula’ (I am blushing 😊).

My ‘formula’ fwiw, since I discovered the liberating micro-genre of ‘Dark Ambient’ (combining my inner teen Goth love of all things dark with grown-up me’s need for a bit of peace and quiet) could probably be distilled down into ‘a year spent listening to ever longer reverbs.’

I like that some of the stuff I seek out to listen to for fun is actually made by depressed Russians living in half abandoned industrial cities in the Arctic Circle, for whom the distant metal noises, mournful wolves and howling winds captured in their work probably count as verbatim field recordings; and the other half is probably made by somebody called Kevin who lives in a maisonette in Sidcup and just wishes he was a depressed Russian in the Arctic Circle. (Hey, Kevins are cool, alright? Sidcup? Eh, not so much...)

Either way, give me some titanic subterranean groans and Lovecraftian Immensity (TM) with the reverb set to 11, and I’m a happy Shoggoth.

Ahhhhhh, Sidcup.
Decades back, urban legends of a Mi-go Tok’l mine in the area were common, but I never found it.

@Paul16 said:

@Svetlovska said:
@Gavinski @MrBlaschke @Philandering_Bastard @despego @Scarred_Archimedes @aplourde : thank you al for the listens, and your kind words

@reasOne , thank you too, but I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t get much out of watching my, ahem, ‘process’ which begins in bed around 6am with me idly picking an app or two and starting to noodle around with them inside AUM, and progresses after breakfast to me slouching around the house in my dressing gown while some kind of loop plays, pausing occasionally to randomly stab at settings and knobs in a chimp-meet-typewriter kind of way until the noise is tamed into something that sounds like it might actually be a thing.

‘Jamming’ would be too dignified a term for this process, as it implies somebody who knows what they are doing, or at least can play, maybe even name, a chord or two. None of these things are true of me, sadly.

Likewise, @Charlesalbert, thank you for suggesting I might have a ‘secret formula’ (I am blushing 😊).

My ‘formula’ fwiw, since I discovered the liberating micro-genre of ‘Dark Ambient’ (combining my inner teen Goth love of all things dark with grown-up me’s need for a bit of peace and quiet) could probably be distilled down into ‘a year spent listening to ever longer reverbs.’

I like that some of the stuff I seek out to listen to for fun is actually made by depressed Russians living in half abandoned industrial cities in the Arctic Circle, for whom the distant metal noises, mournful wolves and howling winds captured in their work probably count as verbatim field recordings; and the other half is probably made by somebody called Kevin who lives in a maisonette in Sidcup and just wishes he was a depressed Russian in the Arctic Circle. (Hey, Kevins are cool, alright? Sidcup? Eh, not so much...)

Either way, give me some titanic subterranean groans and Lovecraftian Immensity (TM) with the reverb set to 11, and I’m a happy Shoggoth.

Ahhhhhh, Sidcup.
Decades back, urban legends of a Mi-go Tok’l mine being hidden in the area were common, but I never found it.

Svetlovska

@Paul16 : so that explains all the dark hints of strange, small, and terrible hidden races of troglodytes and burrowers the newsagent in Sidcup High Street was always complaining about!

Dark and baleful mutterings about ‘midnight gardeners’ digging up his allotment? Yet the elect surely realise to know this unhallowed secret is to invite madness. Such arcane wisdom must go no further, until the stars are aright.

Or next Wednesday, weather permitting.

Svetlovska

On a related note, available now on BBC Sounds is a rather marvellous updating/mashup of Lovecraft’s The Whisperer In Darkness (whence cometh the Mi-go) reimagined as modern mystery podcast meets The X Files via Fortean Times - including scenes set in the allegedly really UFO-haunted Rendelsham Forest. It’s not Sidcup, but it is the UK:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p06spb8w

And more on that breaking Rendelsham Forest story:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rendlesham_Forest_incident

Philandering_Bastard

This is a very educational website. I take it that Sidcup is the equivalent to the German Bielefeld Conspiracy?

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/bielefeld-conspiracy

(it’s not a conspiracy)

Svetlovska

@Philandering_Bastard : not yet, but I’m game to get it going right here if you are Love the Bielefeld Conspiracy, btw, but let me ask you - have you ever been there?

Paul16

@Svetlovska said:
@Paul16 : so that explains all the dark hints of strange, small, and terrible hidden races of troglodytes and burrowers the newsagent in Sidcup High Street was always complaining about!

Dark and baleful mutterings about ‘midnight gardeners’ digging up his allotment? Yet the elect surely realise to know this unhallowed secret is to invite madness. Such arcane wisdom must go no further, until the stars are aright.

Or next Wednesday, weather permitting.

😂🤣😂

A shug ot shop ah'ehye'drnn ephaimgsyha'h ah'n'ghanah impending doom ot gn'thornythh !

https://lingojam.com/RLyehian

Svetlovska

@Paul16 : that’s easy for you to say.

(Great link, btw )

Paul16

@Svetlovska said:
@Paul16 : that’s easy for you to say.

(Great link, btw )

i actually gave up at ‘ ephaimgsyha'h’. partly due to the challenging pronunciation, but primarily because of the feeling of a sudden ominous chill, hints of a green grey mist perceived in the northern most corner of the room & the vague yet insistent auditory suggestion of distant droning pipes.

Svetlovska

LinearLineman

Very peaceful entry to the insane US Memorial Day Madness. Thanks for sharing!